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Bale: Barcelona ‘not the best defensive team’

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Gareth Bale says Real Madrid were always confident of winning at the Nou Camp as Barcelona are “not the best defensive team in the world”.

Real ended Barca’s 39-game unbeaten run on Saturday after coming from behind to win 2-1 and close the gap on the league leaders to seven points with seven games remaining.

It was the first time Real had beaten their great rivals in La Liga since 2014, but the result certainly came as no surprise to Bale.

“We had a game plan, we know we’ve got speed on the counter-attack so we used that to our advantage,” he said.

“We know obviously if you attack them they’re not the best defensive team in the world. They’re great at attacking so we worked on that in training and it’s paid off.

On Real’s chances of winning the title, Bale said: “I think if the league’s still possible to win then we fully believe we can do it. We know it’s not going to be easy, it’s very against us, but if we give ourselves a chance that’s all we can do.

“Most important thing today was to get the win, build confidence for the rest of the season. There’s still the Champions League as well, which we’re really looking forward to. It’s about building and growing strong.

“If we want to win the league this was a game we had to win. You never know, football does funny things to teams when you lose and you never know what could happen. All they need is a few bad results and we need a few good ones and we’re right back in.”

Gerard Pique had headed Barca in front on Saturday, but Karim Benzema volleyed home an equaliser before Cristiano Ronaldo scored a winner with five minutes remaining, just moments before Bale had seen a header harshly ruled out for a push on Jordi Alba.

Bale added: “I can’t believe it was disallowed. [The referee] said to me that I pushed him, I didn’t even touch the guy. I was just a bit taller, I made sure I got over the top, I made sure I didn’t touch him because I know what the Spanish referees are like. A very bad decision in my eyes.”